My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry

From the beginning of the novel, Elsa knows she’s different. Her precocious nature and advanced vocabulary make her stand out from other children. Because she doesn’t act like a typical child, Elsa is bullied by her classmates and criticized by adults. Her only real friend is Granny.

Despite being told that she must learn to “fit in,” Elsa is quite comfortable exactly the way she is. This is largely due to the influence of Granny, who has instilled in her the idea that “all the best people are different—look at superheroes” (1). Therefore, Elsa continues to stubbornly wear her beloved Gryffindor scarf and use advanced vocabulary, even as she is ostracized for this at school.

Granny serves as a positive role model for Elsa because she herself has always been different. For example, she became a surgeon at a time when few women were doctors. When Elsa tells Alf that the kids at school say girls can’t be Spider-Man, Alf says, “I think your grandmother would have wanted you to dress up as any old damned thing you wanted.” (280).

Granny also equates unique qualities with superpowers, telling Elsa that “if superpowers were normal, everyone would have them” (1-2). But throughout the novel, Elsa learns that she and Granny are not the only ones who are different. Everyone is unique in some way, and these differences are what give people their superpowers. For example, Mum’s superpower is efficiency, George’s superpower is likeability, and Britt-Marie’s superpower is authority.

“Different,” for Elsa, is a term of high praise. At the end of the novel, Elsa acquires a group of friends at school, all of whom have perceived differences. Because there are so many of them, they are not chased or bullied. Elsa concludes that “if a sufficient number of people are different, no one has to be normal” (369).

One of the lessons of My Grandmother Asked Me is that there is more to people than meets the eye. From the outset, Elsa has preconceived opinions about some of the tenants in her building based on their appearance or behavior. For example, she is afraid of the enormous, scarred Monster/Wolfheart, and she is disdainful of the nosy, nagging Britt-Marie.

But as her mission brings her closer to her neighbors, she develops a greater understanding of them and an appreciation for their positive qualities. She learns that Wolfheart is far from the menacing beast she originally believed him to be. While he does have the capacity for violence, as evidenced when he beats Sam, he is also a loyal friend and protector, with the heart of a warrior and “the soul of a poet” (257).

The lady with the black skirt most clearly exhibits different sides to her personality. By day she is professional and preoccupied; by night she is a stumbling, pathetic drunk. Yet neither persona adequately describes who she really is—a loving wife and mother consumed by grief over the loss of her family who uses work and alcohol as a coping mechanism. It is only after interacting with Elsa that the woman relaxes her protective barrier. She finds comfort in playing with and holding the boy with the syndrome, and she finds humor and joy in watching Elsa and Alf make snow angels.

Even Britt-Marie, the “full-time nagbag” who initially has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, reveals her humanity when she protects the wurse from the police. And later, Elsa learns that it was Britt-Marie, the daughter of a singing teacher, who taught the drunk songs in order to comfort her in the night, after which “the drunk grew completely calm and went to bed” (361).

Sam is the one character who exhibits a purely “evil” nature. It is unclear whether there is any possibility for redemption for Sam. Even so, Maud and Lennart visit him faithfully in prison because of their eternal hope that they will find some good inside of him. And so they “fight for the good” (367).